The Telegraph reports:

A father has described seeing “carnage everywhere” in the wake of an explosion at Manchester Arena that left around 30 people, including children and disabled victims, lying on the floor.

The man, named Andy, said he was blown “about 30ft” by a blast that shook the building as he waited to collect his wife and daughter at the end of a concert by US artist Ariana Grande.

He said he later saw panicking families trying to find loved ones in the wake of the incident on Monday night.

He told BBC News: “It’s shocking what happened. Just carnage everywhere. There was a good 20 to 30 of them [victims]. Some were young kids, some were disabled people.”

19 dead and 50 injured is the toll to date.  It is almost inevitably a terrorist attack and a reminder of the terrible toll on the innocent that terrorists inflict – whether Islamic State or Hamas or Hezbollah or the IRA.

Thoughts are with everyone in the UK. We are lucky that to date we live in a country where you don’t run the risk of being blown to pieces simply because you were on the wrong train or at the wrong concert.

Stuff reports:

The police and the Wellington city establishment killed the “golden goose” sevens – and tournament organisers collaborated, a hospitality PR expert has claimed.

It was announced on Monday that Wellington would no longer host the annual New Zealand leg of the world sevens series, which would be held in Hamilton for the next two years.

Mark Blackham, director of Wellington-based BlacklandPR, said the demise of the sevens was driven by non-attendees who disliked the behaviour of fans, but gathered strength when it was allied with anti-alcohol and social disorder sentiments.

This is broadly correct.

I’ve heard some people assert that events just have cycles, and the Sevens had peaked and troughed and having it die off (well move to Hamilton – well done Hamilton) is part of a natural cycle.

This is bullshit.

All around the world Sevens tournaments are growing in popularity and attendance. Some like the Hong Kong Sevens have been going for much longer. They are prospering.

This was not a natural death. This was manslaughter.

It takes an extraordinary level of incompetence or malevolence to turn an event from a must attend to a won’t attend. People used to spend months planning to go to the Sevens, working out strategies for buying tickets, designing costumes etc. It was the highlight of the Wellington social calendar. And then it became something that could barely fill a third of the stadium.

The rapid fall in crowd numbers made the tournament financially unviable, and was “caused primarily by the sevens organisers themselves”, he said.

“They criticised crowd behaviour and changed rules that deterred the basis of the enjoyment: a party of silly costumes and silly behaviour, fuelled by alcohol consumption.

“The organisers acquiesced to, and collaborated with, the ‘moral panic’ … among the city establishment, including the council and police.” 

This year there was only one non low alcohol beer on sale!

Police said public safety was their priority, and “the decision to move the event is entirely a matter for the organisers”.

You see part of the problem. If so called public safety is seen as the priority over everything else then Wellington should go back to 6 pm closing and have no concerts and no events.

Westpac Stadium boss Shane Harmon agreed that 2014 was the beginning of the end.

“Fatigue set in for the 2014 tournament when we had new legislation, accompanied by a new police approach, and I believe society’s shifting view towards alcohol.

“I attended a meeting with police in October 2013, and they made it clear they didn’t want the event in Wellington, and would enforce new procedures.

The Police in Wellington became anti alcohol zealots.

Radio NZ reports:

The State Services Commissioner will decide this week whether to launch his own investigation into claims whistleblowers were forced out of their jobs at the Transport Ministry.

Joanne Harrison was sentenced to three years and seven months in prison in February for stealing $723,000 while employed as a top manager at the ministry.

Several long-standing employees lost their jobs in a 2015 restructure just months after they alerted managers to a fake invoice Harrison presented, and questioned her domestic and international travel.

Last week, the ministry’s new chief executive, Peter Mersi, announced he had appointed an independent investigator to look into claims staff who were raising red flags about Harrison were restructured out of the organisation.

He had previously declined to investigate the matter.

Two of those who lost their jobs have told RNZ News they had no doubt the concerns they raised led to their axing.

State Services Commissioner Peter Hughes said the former employees had now asked him to investigate whether they were unfairly forced out.

“I take their concerns seriously and I am currently considering this request.”

This issue will fester away unless there is a comprehensive independent investigation. You don’t need one just because someone committed fraud. But you do need one when the fraud was detected early on and nothing done about it.

The SSC should investigate not just the claims of the whistle blowers, but the entire saga, namely:\

1. How was Harrison hired, despite a fraudulent background. What reference checks were done.
2. How often did staff raise issues of inappropriate spending. Who were they elevated to, and what happened
3. What were the internal controls at the Ministry and why didn’t they work?
4. What was the rationale for the restructuring that saw whistleblowers lose their job, and who was the decision maker in it
5. How often did issues around Harrison come to the attention of then CEO Martin Matthews, and what did he do

I would also look into the wider performance of Harrison. I suspect she wasn’t just a fraudster but someone who produced nothing of value in her job which was one of those nebulous ones such as organisational performance. How was she regarded by other second level managers and by the third level managers that reported to her.

The SSC inquiry would also mean that it could allow a resolution to the issue of whether Matthews should continue as Auditor-General. It is not in anyone’s interest for this to become a political issue. If the SSC inquiry finds that no reasonable CEO would have acted differently, then Matthews might be able to continue. But if it finds that there were enough warning bells that he should have acted sooner, then I think it would provide the opportunity for him to do the honourable thing.

We do need to be careful not to be too zealous over this and set a bar that any agency that has fraud, should result in the CEO losing their job. That would be silly and unhelpful. But when the CEO’s new role is Auditor-General the bar should be very high, and if elements of the fraud was picked up by staff at an early stage then it does raise legitimate questions.

So having the SSC do a full independent inquiry is the best way forward to protect the independence of the Auditor-General’s Office and to allow a conclusion to be reached.

The Family and Whānau Violence Legislation Bill has submissions close end of Wednesday. It is a good bill. One of the provisions introduces a new specific crime to the Crimes Act of strangulation. It says:

Everyone is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 7 years who intentionally or recklessly impedes another person’s normal breathing, blood circulation, or both, by doing (manually, or using any aid) all or any of the following:

(a) blocking that other person’s nose, mouth, or both:

(b) applying pressure on, or to, that other person’s throat, neck, or both.

Jonathan Freedland writes in The Guardian:

Voters tell pollsters all the timethat they want, say, to renationalise the railways or end zero-hours contracts: one party says it’ll give them what they want; the other refuses. How can there not be a resounding Labour victory?

And yet those same polls that show support for individual Labour policies also show an electorate readying to deliver precisely the opposite verdict at the ballot box. How do we explain a country that is poised to spurn Santa and his big bag of goodies and instead willingly embrace Scrooge?

Policies are important, but secondary to credibility and leadership and unity.

The coming rejection of an apparently popular platform will be a brutal reminder of a central truth about politics, that what matters is not just the product you’re offering but your perceived ability to deliver it. It comes down to credibility. Voters don’t believe Labour has a hope of fulfilling its promises.

I think the same applies here. Does anyone actually think a Labour-led government would build 30,000 homes in three years. People know they have no ability to do it. They don’t even have the land for it.

Consider the advice that a glass of red wine a day is good for you. If a doctor says it, you’ll accept it. But if the same advice comes from an alcoholic, you’ll hesitate. Labour aspires to be entrusted with the nation’s health and wealth. But the country first needs to be sure that its hands are not trembling.

Labour is the alcoholic when it comes to the economy and spending.

Until I saw this article in NBR, I didn’t realise how much of an increase there has been with women directors on NZSE100 boards. The stats are:

• 2008 – 8.65%
• 2010 – 9.32%
• 2012 – 14.75%
• 2016 – 20.10%
• 2017 – 22.17%

So since 2008, the proportion of directors who are women has increased by over 150%. All without quotas.

There is a lot of research that shows boards with a mixture of men and women on the board perform better than all male boards.

Stuff reports:

Former US Congressman Anthony Weiner, whose penchant for sexting strangers ended his political career and led to an investigation that upended the US presidential race, has pleaded guilty to criminal charges in connection with his online communications with a 15-year-old girl.

Weiner pleaded guilty to a charge of transmitting sexual material to a minor and could get years in prison. He agreed not to appeal any sentence between 21 and 27 months in prison. …

Weiner, who represented New York in Congress from 1999 to 2011, resigned after revelations that he was sending sexually explicit messages to multiple women.

He ran for New York City mayor in 2013 and was leading several polls until it was revealed he had continued his questionable behaviour. His failed mayoral bid was the subject of the documentary Weiner.

For any married man to sext random people he meets online is a bad idea. Doing it as a Congressman was an even worst idea, as inevitable it would get put eventually. But what shows that this was a compulsion is he carried on after resigning and then running for office again, and then after the next expose, he carried on and on.

Sadly for him it ends with the departure of his wife and a possible prison term.

Stuff reports:

Kielly Garrett, 34, and her husband had just bought a ute and were about to start their own business.

Having heard of a number of business start-up grants, Garrett hopped onto Google, searched for New Zealand Government grants and clicked the first link on the list.

She found a website with a helpful list of New Zealand business grants with branded video testimonials from New Zealanders who had been successfully helped by the scheme, and filled in some details to see what she was eligible for. 

“Within 15 minutes they’d rung me, they sold me a dream.”

“She’s like you’ll need insurance’ and all these things I hadn’t even thought of and I was like ‘oh, you’re onto it!'”

According to the website Garrett had found – NZFundingGrants.org – Garrett was eligible for start-up financing of $10,000.

This is one of the more sophisicated frauds. They do have a fairly credible website and do indeed come up high in Google. I think they even do paid advertising (which Google should decline).

But a key giveaway here is the domain is .org not .nz. This means it is highly unlikely to be an official Government site as they tend to be in govt.nz. Also the fact they are not a .nz site may be significant as .nz sites have to publish the details of the site registrant, while .org do not.

So another check is to do a WHOIS on the domain name. The fact the registrant has hidden their details is a pretty good sign of a scam – especially when the site asks for money.

“They were telling me they’d take this admin fee and I said ‘oh yeah how much is that?’ 

“They said $350 and I was like oh yeah, that’s a bit steep but if you’re offering me $10,000, OK.”

Garrett started getting a sinking feeling as soon as she had submitted her debit card details – she immediately had second thoughts. 

She checked online and discovered she was one of hundreds, possibly thousands, who had been scammed since 2013 by the so-called New Zealand Government Grants Department, New Zealand Small Business Assistance Centre, and two other incarnations centred around the domain names nzfundinggrants.org and nzgovernmentgrants.org.

“I just can’t believe it’s still running, I really can’t,” said Garrett.

“These are the things our government should be stopping, or find out where it’s coming from because these people are nasty people.”

Good she got suspicious. Not a lot the Government can do as the scammers are almost certainly not based in NZ.

Todd McClay writes:

Trade Minister Todd McClay has welcomed a joint statement from the TPP 11 countries saying it shows unity between the 11 and important next steps for the agreement.

“This outcome was better than we might have hoped for. It demonstrates a commitment from all 11 countries to implement the agreement which is extremely valuable for New Zealand and sets a clear path to a meeting of leaders in November of this year,” Mr McClay says.

“TPP is a high-quality set of rules for the Asia-Pacific which will increase market access for our exporters and benefits our wider economy.”

The statement was unanimously agreed to by the 11 countries at a meeting which New Zealand co-chaired with Vietnam on the sidelines of APEC in Hanoi.

This may be the diplomatic coup of the decade. I thought that TPP was dead as a door knob with the US pulling out of it. The US being in it, was why everyone else was in it. To have Japan and Canada say they still want to implement it without the US is amazing.

Stuff reports:

Sweden has dropped its investigation into a rape allegation against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who says he won’t forgive or forget the slandering of his name following an “important victory”.

The country’s Director of Public Prosecutions, Marianne Ny, made the announcement in Stockholm on Friday.

“Chief Prosecutor Marianne Ny has today decided to discontinue the preliminary investigation regarding suspected rape concerning Julian Assange,” the prosecutors’ office said in a statement.

I have several thoughts on this:

1. Julian Assange is a narcissistic doofus
2. I never thought there was enough evidence to support a conviction, or even a prosecution
3. Assange should have flown to Sweden to co-operate and this could have been dealt with years ago
4. His claims that he could be extradited from Sweden to the US was a nonsense pretext to avoid the Swedish justice system – he lived for many years in the UK which is more likely to extradite if requested

I knew Seth Rich. I know he was the @Wikileaks source. I was involved. https://t.co/MbGQteHhZM

— Kim Dotcom (@KimDotcom) May 20, 2017

This is interesting. Dotcom does not have great credibility so an assertion is just an assertion. But if it does transpire the DNC e-mails were leaked by a disgruntled staffer, rather than hacked by Russian interests, then that changes the story considerably.

This Herald story reports that Rich was a huge supporter of Sanders and hence could be motivated to expose a pro-Clinton bias in the DNC.

But an assertion and a possible motive is not proof. And stories suggesting Rich was murdered because of this are wildly speculative and have been based on false facts.

But if Dotcom can or does produce alleged proof, or has some specificity to his allegations, then it is worth considering them. But bearing in mind he almost certainly forged the Warners e-mail about John Key, one should be highly sceptical.

The Taxpayers’ Union has announced:

• Over a lifetime, an average household (gross income of $98,818) will pay $1.48 million in taxes (at 2016 prices).
• This is equivalent to the total income of a household over 15 years.
• Of the $1.48 million, approximately $826,000 is paid in income tax (56% of the total tax bill), $375,000 in GST, $121,000 in council rates, and $40,000 in petrol taxes.

This is why people should take more notice of wasteful Government spending and support lower taxes. You end up paying more in tax than you do for your house.

• Households earning more or less than the average take even longer to pay their lifetime tax bills.
• The average household in the bottom ten percent of income earners will pay $381,187 in direct and indirect taxes, taking 18½ years to pay.
• An average household in the top ten percent of income earners will pay $2,772,842 in direct and indirect taxes, taking 20½ years to pay.

So if you are in the top 10% of income earners, you spend over 20 years working to fund the Government!

“Kiwi’s tax bills are too high – and growing because the Government has not adjusted income tax thresholds to match wage inflation.  Lower taxes don’t mean cuts to services, they mean a focus on cutting out wasteful spending.  We hope Thursday’s Budget indicates renewed fiscal discipline, rather than loosening of the purse strings now that there are surpluses.”

If National can’t deliver meaningful tax relief now, when will they?

The data is from Stats NZ. It is the number of births to teenagers for each calendar year. Quite a remarkable change in trend. From 2002 to 2008 the number kept increasing, while since 2008 the numbers have almost halved.

This is a good thing. While some teenagers will be good parents, I can speak from first hand experience that being a parent is effing hard. It’s challenging enough in your 30s or 40s, let alone when you’re still in school or just out of it.

So why do people think the numbers have fallen away? Government policy on welfare reforms? Just coincidence? Changing societal norms?

The Guardian reports:

The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, fears the refusal of member states to soften their demands over the size of Britain’s “divorce bill” could lead to a collapse in talks and the UK crashing out of the EU without a deal, minutes of a meeting of the European commission reveal.

Barnier has told the commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, and other senior officials that the stakes are so high because Berlin and Paris are refusing to pay more to cover the UK’s departure, while those governments who receive the most from EU funds are opposed to any cuts in spending.

So what they are saying is that they are not willing to increase their contributions to the EU, but also unwilling to reduce the spending of the EU, so their solution is that the UK must keep funding the EU (through a divorce bill) despite no longer being a member, or getting any benefits of membership.

This is fantasy land bonkers.

The Herald reports:

Kiwi kids are a step closer to being able to cycle on footpaths legally after a Parliamentary committee recommended a change to the road rules.

A Petition in the name of Lower Hutt woman Joanne Clendon asked Parliament to allow under-14-year-olds, their guardians, over-65-year-olds and disabled people to be able to cycle on footpaths without falling foul of the law.

The Transport and Industrial Relations Committee has now agreed the petition should be considered, though it recommended a lower age limit of 12 years old to Government.

The committee also said bells should be mandatory for any bicycle used on footpaths or shared use paths, and that councils should be able to exclude some footpaths from being used for cycling.

Those changes sound sensible.

Under the existing New Zealand Road Rules, it is illegal to ride on the footpath unless you are a delivering mail, or unless your wheels have a diameter of less than 355mm – a rule which effectively excludes nearly all bicycles.

This has contributed to a fall in the number of primary school students using bicycles in New Zealand, from about 12 per cent in the 1980s to 2 per cent in 2014.

Sad.

In Australia, all states allow children under 12 and an accompanying adult to cycle on the footpath. Research in that country had found that footpath cycling had not led to any serious injuries for pedestrians, and that collisions were minimal.

It is a great way to get kids building up their cycling skills and confidence.

Stuff reports:

Mike Ward thought he was out of politics forever – but then he started a political party with former Nelson mayor Aldo Miccio.

The Creative Alliance is Ward’s latest venture, one he hopes will encourage the population into thinking differently about New Zealand’s place in the world.

“I thought about it for a very long time – there is a lack of urgency, a lack of optimism and dearth of collaboration,” Ward said.

The 74-year-old artist turned former Green MP turned former Nelson City councillor said every political party thought they had the answer but they were unwilling to listen to each other.

They may struggle to get 500 members let alone 100,000 votes.

The party also advocated a “sustainability role model initiative” or effective tourist tax, which tried to encourage visitors to buy into a responsibility to look after the country.

It also wanted to include “lifestyle, creativity and sustainability” components to all levels of school curricula.

What exactly does that mean?

The Herald reports:

Iran’s state television has declared incumbent President Hassan Rouhani the winner of the country’s presidential election, giving him a second four-year term to see out his agenda calling for greater freedoms and outreach to the wider world.

State TV offered its congratulations in a brief statement Saturday, based on vote tallies.

The 68-year-old has come to embody more liberal and reform-minded Iranians’ hopes for greater political freedom at home and better relations with the outside world.

Preliminary vote tallies earlier had Rouhani ahead with 22.8 million votes, out of 38.9 million counted so far.

This is a very encouraging result as it is a decisive victory for Rouhani. It is a clear sign that most Iranians want to continue on a path of better global relations.

Almost 60% of the vote is pretty much a landslide.

Change is slow to the control by the theocracy, but the direction is important and it remains positive.

Stuff reports:

Economist Gareth Morgan’s political party says cannabis should be regulated for cultivation, sale, and personal use in New Zealand.

The party’s new reform policy, dubbed ‘Real Deal’, aims to reduce harm from cannabis, the party says.

It says the current legislation is not fit for purpose under the 1975 Misuse of Drugs Act.

“With prohibition of cannabis clearly an abject failure the [policy] will take tens of millions of dollars in profits away from gangs and organised crime and use that money for drug education, addiction treatment and harm prevention.”

A very sensible policy.

Richard Harmam writes at Politik:

Carter told RNZ that MPs were “very aware” of the charges that had been laid against Harrison when they were considering Matthews for the position.

He said the committee invited the Serious Fraud Office for a briefing about how Mr Matthews had handled the situation.

“[The SFO] told the committee Mr Matthews had acted in an exemplary fashion from the moment he became suspicious of fraud and that his actions would assist the Serious Fraud Office to obtain a conviction, and that played out correctly.”

The SFO raised no concerns at all about how long it took ministry management to become aware of the fraud, said Carter.

I think there is no question Matthews is a man of probity and did the right thing once they realised Harrison was a fraudster.

The question is whether as Chief Executive, his Ministry had the right controls and procedures in place?

The test should not be that the fraud never happened. You can never be 100% robust against that. But whether there were enough warning bells that it should have been detected earlier. And based on what we now know, it seems there were a fair few warning bells.

Matthew Hooton writes:

Andrew Little has fired his best shot.

No opposition leader receives better media coverage than at their pre-election conference. For John Key in 2008, Helen Clark in 1999 and Jim Bolger in 1990, each had the feel of a coronation.

 Mr Little’s conference went perfectly well. He got on the TV news. His acting lessons with Gliding On’s Ross Jolly have paid dividends.

An appropriate choice of acting coach.

As I wrote here more than two years ago, Winston Peters has resolved to seek the prime ministership after the election, the last senior government role he has not already held.

Back then, his NZ First party was polling in fourth place at about 7% and his plan to take the top job seemed laughable. The daily media reported it had been ruled out by both Mr Key and Mr Little as if they were objective observers or even the decision makers.

Two years’ later, NZ First has doubled its polling numbers and moved into third place ahead of the Greens. As preferred prime minister, Mr Peters is second only to Bill English and ahead of the leading Labour candidate, Jacinda Ardern, with Mr Little bringing up the rear.

I don’t think we’ve ever before had a major party leader in 4th place as Preferred PM, behind his deputy.

Mr Peters knows that if he can get his party up another five points at the expense of Labour, Mr Little – a list MP – will not even be in parliament.  The result might be something like 23% for Labour, 17% for NZ First and 12% for the Greens. 

So does Winston have a decapitation strategy for Labour?

The crisis in the Labour Party would be readymade for Mr Peters to step in, declare that he will be prime minister, Ms Ardern his deputy, Mr Robertson finance minister, Mr Jones foreign minister, Phil Twyford transport and housing minister, and James Shaw climate change minister. Ms Ardern would then become prime minister after 18 months and Mr Peters would retire, to be replaced as NZ First leader by Mr Jones, Ron Mark or Tracey Martin.

Well that would certainly solve the immigration problem, as Kiwis would start leaving to go to Australia again in record numbers!

Stuff reports:

A Marlborough widow who fraudulently collected $373,000 from ACC has lost an appeal against her convictions.

ACC discovered Janice Walker was receiving a widow’s pension while living with another man. …

Walker denied nine criminal charges and took the case to trial. She was found guilty and ordered to pay the money back.

Her lawyer Rob Harrison appealed the decision, arguing last month that Autism Spectrum Disorder could have affected her communication with ACC and the court. She was diagnosed after her sentencing at the Blenheim District Court last year.

She spent 20 years lying and ripping the system off, and then claims it is due to something she found after she was sentenced!

However, the Court of Appeal in Auckland rejected Walker’s appeal on Friday.

She knew what a de facto relationship was and deliberately lied on the forms, the appeal decision said.

Walker raised four children, managed nine or ten rental properties and ran a business, so she must be a “mentally capable” person, the decision said.

Yet greedy for more.

Walker was eligible for weekly compensation from ACC after her husband died in an accident in the late 1980s.

She signed an ACC form every year until 2012 stating she was not married or in a de facto relationship. 

However, an ACC investigation discovered Walker’s new partner moved into her 400-acre Okaramio property in 1992, and helped to build a family home there.

ACC’s investigation in 2013 found their relationship was “in the nature of marriage”, and weekly compensation to Walker should have stopped in 2004.

Walker was recorded as saying in an interview with ACC that she had lied about the man living with her in case it affected her payments.

But she maintained the relationship was not de facto because there was no sexual element.

“We were still living under the same roof, but there was no intimacy, no sleeping together, no talking,” she told an ACC staff member.

A small flaw in her argument though:

They had a child together, shared a bank account and started a family trust

Maybe another virgin birth?